The vegetables, plus a few herbs, are cared for by the church's children's garden club in an 8-foot by 15-foot raised garden they planted themselves.

The experience offers lessons in religion and how to tend the soil, club leaders say.

"We just wanted to introduce children to gardening and exploring how you can learn about God through nature and how He provides for us," said Dede Marshall-Lambert, an adult leaders of the group, which meets Thursday nights.

This year's members, all in elementary school, seemed to already know something about gardening.

On a recent Thursday, after admiring how much their plants had grown in the last week, the youngsters donned gardening gloves and got to work pulling weeds and spreading mulch.

"It doesn't look like anything's come to eat in this garden," Marshall-Lambert said.

But Madison Rowell, 9, of Damascus was worried that deer or bunny rabbits might eat their plants if they did not protect them.

"Do we have marigolds?" she asked. "Marigolds keep animals from coming around."

Madison has two gardens at home, so she knows about these things. She joined the church club because her home gardens are small. She also enjoys gardening with friends, she said.

Other young gardeners agreed.

"It's really fun to garden 'cause you get to see how stuff sprout up, how it grows," said Charlotte Bowe, 8, of Damascus, who cares for a vegetable garden and two flower gardens at home with her mother.

Some of the children are showing a new appreciation for vegetables after growing their own, but not all.

Mike Luzier of Clarksburg said his daughter, Julia Beall, 9, has been eating more vegetables in recent weeks.

Julia joined the club at her grandmother Bernadine Beall's suggestion.

"She helps out more here than she does at home," Luzier said.

After tending to the plants, club members usually works on a craft project, Marshall-Lambert said.

This night they were painting with fruits and vegetables. Marshall-Lambert cut sections of peppers, tomatoes, yellow and green squash and watermelon for the children to examine the seeds and then dip in paint.

"I just want to eat that, eat it in one bite," Madison said, holding a pepper.

In other weeks they pressed flowers and made dried-flower arrangements.

The club started the season with eight members, but Marshall-Lambert said they would be happy to welcome more now that school is out.

"It's very entertaining and it keeps you busy," Madison said. "It's fun to see how nature really works."